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SANCTUARY

Somewhere high in the vast jagged eternity of the Himalayas exists a timeless cluster of weathered stone buildings, clinging to the icy cliff face, attacked by howling alpine winds, only accessible by an ancient winding path, a stone stairway said to be cut into existence by the gods themselves. Nobody has climbed this stairway in centuries.

In 1907, British explorer Charles Norway, said to have gone insane in search of the elusive Yeti (whom only his fierce Australian rival Buck Lancaster claimed to have witnessed a year earlier), took his team of fellow explorers, assistants and admirers with him into the deadly peaks of the Himalayas, never to be seen again. After a month of pointless wandering, their last known contact with the outside world, at the monastery of Paro Taktsang, went down in legend as being bizarre. Norway, caked in ice and missing many digits (as well as most of his crew), was said to have been speaking in tongues, uttering things about a terrible disease, about a prisoner of the gods, about a simple truth that threatened to undermine society. Then he and his most loyal friends and mountaineers disappeared again, forever.

Ten years later, near the end of World War I, renowned expeditioner Bront Brontson and an international crew of dedicated scientists, mountaineers, military officers and local Nepalese are on the trail after a decade of fading public interest in the story of (posthumously knighted) Sir Norway. It began with the discovery of Norway's base camp at the foot of a colossal, antediluvian staircase carved directly into a massive mountain, a mountain too newly discovered (or rather, re-discovered) to even have been named yet.

However, something quickly became clear. Due to the nature of the mountain and surrounding topography, every day vicious winds slice across the face, making it impossible to travel. Night is calmer but not by much, forcing the explorers into a nocturnal assault. It's constantly snowing. It's tough going - the staircase has been eroded and reshaped over many many years into a hazardous ascent: part ice-chute, part collapsing ruin. In some places where the mountains have oozed apart, blocks are dangerously close to dropping directly into abysses and chasms below. It's cold. There may not be enough supplies. And there's something out there, in the snow. Something deadly.

And not just that. The very first day of the staircase's discovery, at the same instant everyone beheld the much distant shape of what might just be a building near the top of the mountain, Bront Brontson was murdered, from behind, with an icicle.

When I see how many people join I'll then put up the names/professions/slight backstory of everyone in the group, you can choose which you want. But of course each role has secrets too. There are more things going on than meets the eye.

Brontson's Team:

[1] …

[2] …

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Brontson's Team:

[1] Framm = Scout

[2] Araver = Gregor Ivanov

[3] maurice = Nischal

[4] Blablah = Vice Admiral Sebastian Mordock

[5] dawh

[6] Hirkala = John the Savage

[7] Segul

[8] GMaster479 = Mr. Kirkpatrick

[9] woon = Willem Klein

[10] Izzy = Brother Mandrake :D

Edited by Izzy
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Does anybody know where dawh or Segul are? It's been 24 hours since the roles were released. :unsure:

Even DD and DN took the replacement places, you still can assign roles to dawh and segul:

dawh - Yeti

Segul - Explorer Charles Norway

Reason: both of them cannot be found till now.......

Have fun. :P

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Brontson's Team:

[1] Framm = Scout

[2] Araver = Gregor Ivanov

[3] maurice = Nischal

[4] Blablah = Vice Admiral Sebastian Mordock

[5] dawh

[6] Hirkala = John the Savage

[7] Segul

[8] GMaster479 = Mr. Kirkpatrick

[9] woon = Willem Klein

[10] Izzy = Brother Mandrake :D

[XX] DD = Hieronymus Fabricius

I'll play the good doctor...

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great! Sorry to dawh and Segul, I know you both wanted to play, but we did wait 2 and a half days, so I hope you're not too mad or anything. Here's the roster:

Brontson's Team:

[1] Framm = Scout

[2] Araver = Gregor Ivanov

[3] maurice = Nischal

[4] Blablah = Vice Admiral Sebastian Mordock

[5] DD = Hieronymus Fabricius

[6] Hirkala = John the Savage

[7] DarthNoob = Vick Brontson

[8] GMaster479 = Mr. Kirkpatrick

[9] woon = Willem Klein

[10] Izzy = Brother Mandrake

(I'll PM the secret info after posting the intro story)

Dawn, 1917… The frostbitten plateau at the base of this anonymous peak is a mighty thing to behold for being so mundane. It's lined by crags and spears jutting their icy fingers into the oxygenless air. Hundreds of miles from any known civilization, a small huddle of red tents, washed by pools of lampglow, fights the glacial conditions bravely.

In these tents, ten occupants - one of them the great Bront Brontson - wait eagerly for the eleventh member of the team, Scout, to return from navigating the mysterious icy staircase to the long hidden sanctuary.

While everyone else huddles around artificial warmth in the tents, only a man so determined as Bront Brontson waits outside, at the foot of his greatest discovery, at the moment of beautiful (but near sunless) dawn, peering into the swirling fogs hiding any vantage point of Scout's safe return. This makes Bront nervous and fidgety. He looks around impatiently, cold, but determined.

He's about to get a lot colder. Someone is creeping up out of the shadows cast by the lamps and fires. Someone holding an icicle, as nervous as Bront, hand shaking. A quick plunge, a yell muffled by a hand, another stab, jab, stab, another, another. The bloody icicle is left in the back of the great explorer. The assassin recedes back into the shadows.

Twenty minutes later, Scout descends the capstone of the staircase, (engraved in some forgotten language) and finds the body. In less than two minutes, everyone knows, and the situation has quickly deteriorated into shouting matches, stubborn shock and resolute anger… and fear. What will happen to the mission? To the lives of the remaining explorers?

"We should keep going," Mr. Kirkpatrick says adamantly. "We all signed on knowing that some of us wouldn't be coming back." (Hieronymus shuffles his feet agitatedly.) "Bront was a great man" (Vick nods, eyes still blank and suffering) "but this is not a one-man escapade and never was. We have representatives from many countries and many backgrounds. We have military oversight, scientific presence, and a kickass chef. Let's make something out of all the funding I put into this, let's not be deterred by Bront's death but rather strive on in his name and in his honor!"

"We should go back," mutters the Savage.

"No, I agree with Mr. Kirkpatrick," butts in Vice Admiral Mordock with a knowing smile. "I refuse to return in shame. In failure."

"I'm on the same page. This is it for me. This mountain attracts me - if you guys turn back, I'll go on alone," states Dr. Fabricius.

"This is a dangerous place," Nischal says. "Not a good place. Not a place where life happens."

"Precisely why we conquer it," replies Mr. Kirkpatrick. "Let us ask young Vick. If you want to turn back, we'll honor your needs."

"No," breathes Vick. "We go on."

"So it's decided!" Mandrake exclaims. "Oh, good! I was hoping we were going to argue out in the wind all day. What did you find out Scout?"

A muffled indistinguishable voice emerges from Scout's snowmask: "It's hard going. The winds are too fast during the day. We'll have to camp and sleep in the daytime, though we won't have all that much time for sleep everyday, if we want to make any progress at all. We'll ascend in the night, but it's tricky. Everyone needs to do at least another hour of practice with the pitons and rappelling equipment. And you might as well get rid of your softer boots, we'll need the studs, all the way up. And probe poles, because of the kind of ravines that have opened up."

"This is ridiculous," says the Savage. "We can't possibly make it."

"Stop being such a pussy," quips Mordock. "Bront didn't die for nothing."

"Bront died so we can tell when to turn back," Nischal reasons, but Kirkpatrick cuts through the arguing with "I thought we already decided this. We're going. We just need proper preparation - my faith is in Scout."

Ignoring the quibbling, Scout continues: "It looks like we'll be able to cover varying distances each night, depending on the type of terrain. That way each night is a different terrain. I estimate that after five nights of travel we can reach the sanctuary… if we push ourselves to the limit. Luckily we have exactly 90 days worth of rations. For nine people, that's 5 days up, 5 days down. (The Savage doesn't need our food according to him. So far that's been true). One of the most important rules of ascension is don't go up if you don't have enough supplies to come back down."

"Perfect," says Mandrake. "What about gear?"

"We should be set, unless we come across some kind of obstacle we couldn't have anticipated. In that case we'll have to either innovate or turn back. It's as simple as that. If we proceed systematically we might all make it up and down alive."

"Um, I have a question," Ivanov says. "What if… what if Norway didn't come back because he found the Yeti? Or rather, it found him. And what if, what if it finds us?"

"Don't be ludicrous," Klein rolls his eyes. "I've been researching Himalayan organisms for my entire career. I'll have you know I'm the recipient of several prestigious biological awards. And I've never come across this 'abominable snowman' of legend. If such a thing exists it's probably more afraid of us than we are of it. Or maybe not, knowing you idiots. But anyway it's the least of our problems."

Finally, Vick couldn't take this anymore. He lets out an earsplitting scream: "We're forgetting something! We're talking about trivialities! Has everyone already forgotten??? Someone just killed my father, in cold blood!"

An uncomfortable silence follows.

"That is a problem," Scout mumbles. "I don't really know how to proceed about it. As if normal, I suppose, but with extra caution."

"Be careful who you trust," sneers Vick, looking around with dark eyes.

"Yes, well, we can jump that hurdle in a minute here. The day has just begun, we just arrived here, we've been hiking for the past 24 hours to just get here. We need rest. This will be our first day of rest. And during the day, well, we can delve into our current problem at hand. But remember, after resting, we start our ascent tonight. At dusk."

Edited by unreality
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By the way, this game is very experimental. I don't know how exactly the gameplay will go, there are too many fluid factors. So a lot of the storytelling is up to the players. Feel free to flesh out your backstories within reason, and kind of make it an immersive experience, because the way I see it's 1/4 actual game with fixed and rules, and more like 3/4+ of fluid roleplaying/storytelling. There's a lot of degree of freedom here. Play with it and get into it as much as you want :D

Edited by unreality
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Alright boys. I vote for complete transparency on this one. The knowing Flying Spaghetti Monster sees all anyway, but to deceive one's mortal brothers is a sin. I think we should investigate privately, but information should be brought to light in the main thread. We, as a group, should solve this, with haste, so we can continue on and complete our other objectives on the mountain.

The assassin is likely someone we'll need, and for everyone's survival sake, I ask he complies with us while on the mountain. If you behave yourself instead of trying to run off, getting yourself killed, your punishment may be less severe.

Thoughts?

Edited by Izzy
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Nischal:

Here are my thoughts...What is our goal, to reach the top of this mountain or to bring the murderer to justice? Perhaps it is just to survive. These mountains possess spirits who will allow us the third objective so long as we do not attempt the first. If we proceed, we should not just be wary of a "killer" but also of the spirits that roam these mountains. They are already among us. The proof is in the back of Mr. Brontson. And by the way, may I suggest that we do right by his remains, lest his spirit joins those shadows that we have obviously already angered. Any opportunity for appeasement should not be taken lightly.

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I have faith that The Flying Spaghetti Monster will keep us safe, so long as we do what we are destined to do. That includes solving this murder. The mountain will be here when we wake up, in ten years, or in one thousand years, Gawd willing. The clues that will let us solve this and the people involved have limited life-spans. We have enough resources to solve this, pay our respects, and only then move on. WWFSMD? The immediate danger here is that one of us is a murderer and we don't even know why. Continuing on under those conditions is ridiculous.

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Scout:

I have nothing to hide involving this murder, but I would suggest making up your mind and get some rest before having to traverse this mountain. Climbing this mountain will take all of our strength and focus when we do start climbing so get as much information as you can, and then forget about it during the climb.

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